His love of reading led to Pablo Lecuona to become an activist; His fight focused on facilitating access to books for people living with visual disabilities. This is his story.
Pablo was born in Buenos Aires in 1974, when he turned two years old, an ophthalmologist diagnosed him with a retinal condition that would cause him to progressively lose his sense of sight.
With the support of his parents and Argentine Association of Visual Disability Professionals, Pablo was learning to adapt to change and fend for himself; He was enrolled in primary school and from his adolescence he was able to lead an independent life.
“My parents gave me freedom to grow up. When I was a teenager I went to Patagonia and I brought my cane. “It ended up being everyone’s cane because my friends used it to walk on the rocks,” he recalled in a talk with Infobae.
How was Tiflolibros born?
Pablo also studied a degree in Communication Sciences at the University of Buenos Aireswhere it was evident that access to books had barriers for people with disabilities, which affect their right to education and to have better employment opportunities.
“In the nineties, it was accepted that some books were recorded, but they were very few. When we started chatting with my friends, we realized that there was a intellectual property rights to respectbut at the same time it affected our right to read,” he said.
Pablo remembers that he and his friends began to build Tiflolibros almost without resources, only mobilized by the interest and needs of people with visual disabilities. Afterwards they had donations, they made agreements to carry out projects with different institutions and they were recognized with seven international awards for improving the lives of many PWD.
This is how he became an activist, because when he founded with his friends the first digital library for Spanish-speaking people with visual disabilitieswas one of the promoters of the Marrakesh Treatywhich now allowed 34 thousand books to be recorded with a human voice in Spanish and be easily accessible for PWD.
“Many years of fighting so that books reach the people”
This is the first internet library specifically designed and available for Spanish-speaking people who live with some type of visual disability or dyslexia that prevents access to reading.
The objective of the project is extend access to reading and information by taking advantage of new technologiesthus contributing to improving the quality of life and promoting the autonomy of people with visual disabilities.
“In Argentina there were only five thousand book titles recorded with a human voice. After the Marrakesh treaty, there are now 34 thousand and there will be more in the future,” he assured.
In 2016, Pablo traveled to France to receive the UNESCO Prize/ Emir Jaber Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah for the Empowerment of People with Disabilities, and the following year it was recognized with an award from the Accessible Books Consortium (ABC) of the World Intellectual Property Organization.
“It was quite a journey. “Many years of fighting and fighting so that the books reach the people,” she concluded.
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